Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin (17 January 1706-17 April 1790) was an American scientist, printer, inventor, satirist, political theorist, diplomat, polymath, and Postmaster-General who was considered to be one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He invented Franklin's Busybody, the Franklin stove, Franklin's Glass harmonica, Franklin's kite and key, the Electrostatic generator, a Leyden jar, Joseph Priestley's soda apparatus, an orrery, and the Watt steam engine. He wrote Poor Richard's Almanac, which was immensely popular.

Biography
The tenth son of a soap maker, he was born in Boston, of English descent. In 1718 he became an apprentice printer for his brother, and although his relationship was rocky, he gained many followers after revealing that he was the "Silence Dogood", who had printed many satires in the newspaper. In 1723 he left for Philadelphia and founded the fire team as well as becoming publisher of the Pennsylvania Gazette. During this time he started writing on Poor Richard' Almanack, which contained ideas for inventions, and many pages were torn out and stolen by others so that they could steal the research. In 1754 Franklin, in Boston, asked Haytham Kenway for help in finding the missing Almanac pages, and promised him a reward for the pages.

In 1755 Franklin started developing ideas of independence of the Thirteen Colonies from Britain. Kenway was intrigued by these ideas, capturing his attention. In the 1760s and 1770s he resisted the Intolerable Acts that Great Britain had placed on the city of Boston, and in 1776 he signed the Declaration of Independence. His son William Franklin, the colonial governor of New Jersey, betrayed him for the loyalist cause. Benjamin never spoke to his son again.

In 1778 Franklin negotiated the American alliance with France with aid from John Adams, which irrevocably won the war for America's patriots. He was also the one who ended the war by meeting with British delegates in Paris in 1783, signing a peace treaty. Afterwards he served as Postmaster-General, and was the oldest member of the Constitutional Convention in 1789. He died a year later.